Writer Philip K. Dick the author of the science fiction novel “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep” explores a world overrun by nuclear warfare defined by two warring factions, humans and droids. Philip constantly contrasts the two using one critical factor, empathy. In his novel he demonstrates how empathy sets aside human beings from droids and other beings and reflects on the hypocrisy some of them reflect hiding behind empathy while in the real sense all they are after is self-preservation and social approval, adding to the plot twist.
In his novel it is widely evident that the author strongly believes that empathy is the ultimate defining factor setting aside human beings from other life forms. He however does not shun away to point out how people’s conniving behavior use it for self-gain. For instance, He criticizes Mercerism as a hypocritical religion which preaches one thing and does the other as is portrayed by the character Wilbur Mecer. Mercerism teaches that all who feel empathy must be accepted and integrated into human society but contradicts itself by refusing to acknowledge the ‘chickenheads’ back on earth and refuses to admit them into mars.
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Philip uses the character Isadore to show true empathy as the distinguishing factor between humans and other beings. For instance, Isadore a mere chickenhead, after witnessing a spider he had brought to the droids get its legs stripped from its body drowns it to put it out of its misery. He empathizes with the spider and opts to kill it rather than watching it suffer a decision which costs him a huge amount of profit had he sold the spider. Philip extensively portrays empathy as the uniting factor in human societies. His addition of the Mercerism religion is to show that in a desperate situation, human beings will cling to a unifying belief system that justifies their empathy in an attempt to maintain their humanity regardless of the systems legitimacy and questionable standards.
